United States-Canada-Mexico Fact Sheet on Trade and Migration

This report examines the trilateral relationship between the United States, Canada, and Mexico in the decade since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and provides facts and figures relating to trade and migration among the three countries.

The report finds that the United States is the most important trading partner—both for imports and exports—for Canada and Mexico. Canada and Mexico send at least 85 percent of their exports to the United States and approximately 60 percent of both countries’ imports come from the United States.

The U.S.-Canada trading relationship represents the largest bilateral flow of income, goods, and services in the world, while Mexico is the United States’ second largest trading partner after Canada. Additionally, the report indicates that foreign direct investment and remittances also constitutes a significant factor in trade between Mexico and its NAFTA partners.

Travel from Canada and Mexico to the United States appears to have declined between 2000 and 2004; figures show a 20 percent drop in the volume of inspections at U.S. air, land and sea ports. During the same period, the number of Canadian professionals granted TN (Trade NAFTA) temporary visas to work in the United States, decreased by 28 percent. Permanent immigration flows to the United States increased in FY 2004. Mexico was the country of origin for over 18 percent of new U.S. legal permanent residents, while Canadian immigrant admissions comprised less than 2 percent of total admissions. Americans represent about 5 percent of Canada’s and 63 percent of Mexico’s foreign-born population.

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Experts

Demetrios G. Papademetriou is Co-Founder of MPI and President of Migration Policy Institute Europe.
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Doris Meissner, former Commissioner of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, directs MPI's U.S. immigration policy work.
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